Former pres ordered to drop UESU case against Timoshenko

The former prime minster is also accused of tax evasion to the tune of 47 million hrivnas /some six million dollars/

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KIEV, April 5 (Itar-Tass) — Ukraine's Prosecutor General Viktor Pshonka stated that his predecessor Svyatoslav Piskun had dropped the criminal case against Yulia Timoshenko, in which she was accused of financial violations as head of the Unified Energy Systems of Ukraine /UESU/, at former President Viktor Yushchenko's order. Pshonka said so at a news conference on Thursday.

"On January 24, 2005, Timoshenko took prime minister's office, and on January 28, Prosecutor General Piskun dropped criminal prosecution. I talked with Piskun about the illegal resolution to drop the criminal case which he had sealed with his signature.

"Piskun candidly said that the then President Yushchenko had phoned him to order to drop the case. Understanding that it was illegal, Piskun told the president that the investigators would object, as the case was not finished. To which Yushchenko replied: If you don't drop it now, you won't be prosecutor general tomorrow. And Piskun dropped the case.

"He made this decision, let him give an assessment to himself in his prosecutor's career, and let other lawyers and his colleagues judge him," the prosecutor general added.

Former Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko, leader of the Batkivshchina Party, is serving a 7-year-sentence at the Kachanovskaya penitentiary, Kharkov, for exceeding her authority when signing gas supply contracts with Russia in 2009.

On April 19, the Kiev district court of Kharkov will begin a new trial of Timoshenko in the case over financial violations at the Unified Energy Systems of Ukraine corporation, which she had headed at one time.

Earlier, head of Ukraine's Security Service /SBU/ Igor Kalinin stated that the investigators had gathered enough evidence of former primer Yuri Timoshenko's guilt. "The SBU investigation department works continuously and as of today, it has enough proofs to perform further procedural actions," Kalinin said.

On October 13, 2011, head of the SBU's main investigation department Ivan Derevyanko stated that a new criminal case had been opened against Yulia Timoshenko for making the UESU debt a liability of the country's budget. Timoshenko headed the UESU in 1995-1997.

The investigators accused the former premier of making the 405.5-milion-dolalr debt of the UESU to the Russian Defense Ministry a liability of the Ukrainian state budget.

The former prime minster is also accused of tax evasion to the tune of 47 million hrivnas /some six million dollars/.